US Army backs Tern’s GPS alternative with $11.26M contract

Austin-based Tern has won a $11.26 million U.S. Army contract to deploy its low-cost GPS alternative technology in vehicles. The startup has described its system as “Google Maps for the battlefield,” though it did not disclose the exact scale of the deployment.

The deal places Tern in a growing category of resilient navigation technologies built for environments where GPS may be unreliable, jammed, or unavailable.

The Army is tapping Tern as GPS disruptions are rising, including in the Middle East and in the skies above Ukraine and Russia. TechCrunch also notes that the U.S. military has reportedly experimented with GPS jamming, underscoring why backup and non-GPS navigation systems are drawing attention.

For military users, the key takeaway is operational resilience: navigation that can keep working when satellite-based systems are degraded or contested.

Tern’s system uses data that modern vehicles already generate while driving. Co-founder and CEO Shaun Moore said the company has “a device that plugs into the diagnostics board of the vehicle, wired to a tablet,” with the tablet serving as the soldier’s interface for position, navigation, and routing.

Moore said Tern is “passively listening to” vehicle information and using “proprietary methods” to turn it into usable navigation data, including latitude and longitude. The company says edge processing helps a vehicle determine its own position independently, including on- and off-road, in tunnels, or in deserts.

Tern says its technology is a closed system, which TechCrunch reports may make it harder for adversaries to disrupt than conventional GPS-dependent tools. Co-founder Brett Harrison recently used it during a 1,300-mile drive from Austin to Laguna Beach, California; according to the article, Tern’s system did not lose the vehicle’s place while traditional GPS cut out dozens of times.

Harrison, a military veteran, framed the Army contract as validation after years of proving the technology. His stated goal was not a “science project,” but something “actually deployable” and scalable enough to serve a purpose in the field.